At Chunfenglou, time for tea

A gaudy red sign hangs outside the entrance to Chunfenglou (春鳳樓, House of the Spring Phoenix) on Kueisuei Street (歸綏), known in Taipei as "hooker street." Colorful neon lights adorn the building's exterior, and red florescent lights shine from inside, adding to the exotic atmosphere of the house near Yenpin North Road.

Kueisuei Street once bustled and glittered with numerous brothels and their clientele at night. "In the old days, it was like a street with a lot of movie theaters," said Mrs. Chu, a local resident. "It was so popular."

As in many other establishments nearby, Chunfenglou had rooms upstairs where high-class prostitutes drank with their clients, and rooms downstairs for "resting." And when evening came, the whole neighborhood would come alive with activity.

Times have changed, and the open prostitution and bright bordellos are long gone. But last Sunday's reopening of Chunfenglou, which closed its doors when licensed prostitution was abolished two years ago, seems to have brought back something of the neighborhood's old festive spirit.

The new Chunfenglou is now a teahouse, not a brothel. Its mission is to serve as a testimony to the vanished brothel culture of Kueisuei Street, and as a base for activists fighting for the rights of Taipei's sex workers.

"Here we have only erotic activities, not sex deals," said Wang Fang-ping (王芳萍), herself a well-known activist for the rights of sex workers and one of the organizers behind the reopening of Chunfenglou.

And for Wang Fang-ping, this is exactly the kind of atmosphere she wants to encourage for this teahouse. "It's a place where you can talk about sex freely, in a healthy way, and the sisters will tell you everything they know about safe sex," Wang said.

Here you see what a brothel used to look like. Friday is karaoke night, and there are screenings of films and documentaries about sex workers every other Saturday. And of course, there are the services of the sex workers themselves. They don't sell sex anymore, but they will share their experiences with you.

A dozen old photos of the ladies, which customers used to choose their girls, still hang on the wall at the entrance to Chunfenglou. The wall is now decorated with a pink feather boa and several sex toys, and on the floor are two cushions that look like sex organs, and another one in the shape of a pair of lips.

"When we were working, we used to sit on the bench outside the house, waiting. When a man approached you, he would give you a look. You would give him a look back and then you knew you'd walk with him into the room," said 53-year-old Ah Ying, retired two years ago and one of the former sex workers who now work in Chunfenglou. "They seldom used the photos to pick."

Ah Ying's old "working room" is small affair, with worn sheets and a thin blanket spread across a twin bed. Two sexy dresses hang next to the tiny dressing table. Everything is bathed in red fluorescent light.

"Red light makes your face look nicer, and customers can't see the powder on your face, or the wrinkles," said Chia-mei, another former sex worker and current staff at the house.

How many customers did she have?

"Thousands!"Ah Ying replied with a proud look. "I've seen all sorts of sick freaks on this bed. Guys with fetishes, people into S&M, and guys with huge equipment."